


Old Horseman Blood

by Yotsubadancesintherain5



Category: BoJack Horseman
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, One Shot, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:22:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23759806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yotsubadancesintherain5/pseuds/Yotsubadancesintherain5
Summary: Hollyhock hopes it's just a dumb teenager thing.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 29





	Old Horseman Blood

The coffee went down easily that morning and there was not enough room in Hollyhock’s belly for much else. The house smelled like coffee, various alcohols, Tina’s hand sanitizer, and that distinctive old lady smell.

She was often shuttled to about sixteen pairs of grandparents that always gave her different types of candy. The candy seemed color-coded to her grandparents’ personalities, and she went over the list of what she called them – granny, gramps, grandpa, grandma – when Beatrice made a forlorn noise.

Hollyhock’s heart pinched in sympathy for Beatrice’s lost baby doll. But then she made the connection between candy and Beatrice’s words, “No one loves a fatty Patty.”

It was another log of fuel to that section of Hollyhock’s brain that burned with disparaging comments. Usually she could draw away focus from those internal words. But she was out here with someone that first reacted to her crying with disgust and he was someone she didn’t know, besides seeing him on TV and so many commenting on how alike they looked.

Better than Beatrice’s words Hollyhock’s brain replayed every school assembly’s “Stranger Danger!” creeds with a side of, “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!” It kept the spiraling away as she helped Tina with the house.

But in the evening – with Beatrice’s despondency and Bojack just going off to get drunk – one little thought snapped.

“ _Why doesn’t he want to stay with me?_ ”

It was stupid. Hollyhock barely knew him.

But all those “Chicken Noodle Soup for the Soul,” stories portrayed meeting your birth parents as a lovely Earth-moving experience where everything clicked into its right place. It was schlocky for her tastes but now she wished it was a little true.

Instead she was dealing with the thoughts that were spilling out.

“ _Your mom didn’t want you either. No one wants you_.”

“ _That’s why Miles ghosted you. He got close to you and didn’t like what he saw_.”

“ _It’s happened before! Fern told you in eighth grade to never text her again! You’re always the problem_.”

“ _Oh, your dads want you? And what’d you do? Go off and leave_.”

“ _Nobody’s going to love you forever and you’re going to die alone and you deserve that_.”

Her skin felt itchy, she thought of maggots squirming under her skin, it had been itching since breakfast, claw through her skin, now, now, now –

“ _No, no, no, no, don’t do that, do something else_.”

So that was how Hollyhock found matches, settled out next to the pool, and flicked them into the pool. A flash of flame that was smothered by chlorinated water. One for every time her skin _itched_.

Bojack eventually came out to talk and blamed himself for being stand-offish. He confirmed her question that part of her brain was just a dumb teenage girl thing that went away.

He had lied to her before but this time she decided to believe him.

**Author's Note:**

> Hollyhock is my second favorite character (after Princess Carolyn) and like many other viewers, the last couple of lines in "Stupid Piece of Shit!" was like someone tied up all my heartstrings and pulled hard. Especially since she's dealing with all that stuff and then it turns out Beatrice is poisoning her; and the implication that Bojack might've fallen prey to it as well at some point because he immediately knew how Beatrice was drugging the coffee.


End file.
